What does Land Use Change mean?

The Palm Islands and The World in Dubai

Are you familiar with the gigantic Palm Islands on the sea shore of Dubai? They are an expressions of land use change and/or land reclamation. Those artificial islands are an example of human encroachment.


What does land use change mean? This tutorial will answer this question with your help.

Land use in Geography means the usage of land by humans. Land use change is a variation or change of land use, for example, forest clearances, growth of cities, and also renaturation of former industrial sites.


Contents of the Tutorial:

  • Global land use change
  • Urbanisation - The growth of cities
  • Global examples of human induced land use change, such as land clearance in the tropics
  • Mass tourism - Holiday island Tenerife

For a direct link to the chapters, click on one of the images above!

Sep 2003 Nov 2004 Sep 2006 Feb 2009
Dubai 2003
Satellite image of the shore of Dubai, September 2003.
Source: NASA Aster

Task: Compare the images of the shore of Dubai with each other and with more recent images e.g. from Google Earth. Describe the changes.